The Rock Is About Twelve Feet In
Height, Of An Irregular Shape Approaching To A Cube.
There are some
apertures upon its surface, through which the water is said to have
burst out; they are
[P.579] about twenty in number, and lie nearly in a straight line round
the three sides of the stone. They are for the most part ten or twelve
inches long, two or three inches broad, and from one to two inches deep,
but a few of them are as deep as four inches. Every observer must be
convinced, on the slightest examination, that most of these fissures are
the work of art, but three or four perhaps are natural, and these may
have first drawn the attention of the monks to the stone, and have
induced them to call it the rock of the miraculous supply of water.
Besides the marks of art evident in the holes themselves, the spaces
between them have been chiselled, so as to make it appear as if the
stone had been worn in those parts by the action of the water; though it
cannot be doubted, that if water had flowed from the fissures it must
generally have taken quite a different direction. One traveller saw on
this stone twelve openings, answering to the number of the tribes of
Israel; [Breydenbach.] another [Sicard, Mémoires des Missions.]
describes the holes as a foot deep. They were probably told so by the
monks, and believed what they heard rather than what they saw.
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